Sunday 5 June 2011

A week of planting & harvesting

First the harvesting: Today as the flowers on the Rocket Potatoes had died away it was time to dig them up.
Planted almost exactly 2 months ago on the 6th of April, even I'm surprised they are ready so soon. But as you can see from the photo they look really good and will be part of tonight's dinner. Other crops harvested this week: Lettuce, Radish, Spring Onions, Mini Cucumbers, Strawberries & Raspberries.


This week we have planted lots of crops: Courgettes, Squashes, Peppers, Aubergines & Pumpkins.

Here you can see one of the Courgettes.

Tip of the week: Using 2ltr soft drink bottles you can make a mini cloche from the bottom 2/3rds, then the top, with screw cap removed, can be used as a water reservoir for any thirsty plant.

Here you can see our Manure heap, but as we are not using it anymore, I have covered it in weed suppressing fabric and planted 2 Pumpkins directly through the fabric into the manure pile. These too have bottle top reservoirs so we can get water to where its needed, the roots.

So no space is wasted on our plot.




Even our cold frames get used when empty, so we fill old compost sacks with our own mix of compost & manure and put them into the cold frame then plant up with Round Courgettes & Butter Nut Squashes, bottle top reservoirs are used here too as they can dry out quickly.




Chicken News:
Our 4 'ladies' Hetty, Betty, Peggy & Maud are as cheeky as usual, here you can see them queuing up at the patio door for their daily treat of Super Mixed Corn from the Small Holder range of feeds.

They are still laying an egg each a day and so tasty they are too.

5 comments:

  1. Those chickens are so cute!

    ReplyDelete
  2. thinking of putting spare melons in the coldframe here this year [with fingers crossed]

    ReplyDelete
  3. These all look fab! I planted my rocket potatoes about the same time as you - can't wait to have a peek and see if they're ready yet!!! Thankyou for the bottle top reservoir idea - I'll be using that :-) Love 'n' hugs, Mel xx

    ReplyDelete
  4. Fab tip about the bottle, will have to remember that and am very jealous of your chickens!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Well done with the spuds, ours are still in flower so not too long yet all being well... :) Never thought of putting squash straight into the manure like that, I did mix some into the holes when I planted them tho...

    ReplyDelete